Category Archives: Family

rise and set – bookends

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Watching the sunset is one of my favorite things to do at the end of the day. At home I don’t get the opportunity as the sunset is obscured by homes and trees. Though sometimes I can catch the sunset while I drive home after school, it’s rare especially in the springtime after the time changes and the sun sets after 7 in the evening.

the sunset at Seven Mile Bridge – east end Thursday 3/29/18

When we are up north at the lake, we usually have a clear view of the sunset. When we are here in the Keys we make time to see the sunset, timing our dinner for the time before the sunset or after the sunset or sometimes selecting a place to enjoy dinner where we can watch the sunset. We need to plan and choose the right spot, but we can usually find a place to watch the sunset over the Gulf of Mexico that’s within fifteen minutes of where we are staying. After all, we are on an island or a series of islands.

Today is Friday, Good Friday, it’s the last full day of Spring Break and March. Tomorrow we pack and clean the condo and begin our journey home and back to school. So far, we’ve been able to see several sunsets and had one ‘epic fail’ trying to see the sun slide beneath the ocean’s horizon. Continue reading rise and set – bookends →

my favorite place – a photo challenge

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sunrise Sunday morning – first full day in the Keys

It’s spring break and we are in Florida. Specifically, the Keys. It’s a favorite place of ours for spring break. Summer, of course, is a different matter.

As a teacher I get Spring Break and fortunately, for me, our children’s spring break is the same as mine.

The past three spring breaks, we’ve come here – Key Colony Beach – in the middle Keys. We’ve been here several other times as well going back to our first visit in 2002. My wife’s memories date back to her childhood. It’s where my son earned his scuba certification before his summer Boy Scout high adventure trip to the Florida Sea Base a little further east from where we are currently staying.

We booked our trip well before school started and we’ve been looking forward to coming back since last year’s trip. We were worried that the adventure would be a little different this year due to Hurricane Irma’s visit in September ’17 – six and half months ago.

Where we staying appears to be back to normal. However, there are signs everywhere that there is a new normal. The landscaping where we are staying is all new and many of the properties around us are still being repaired. Several properties have not re-opened and we discovered yesterday Bahia Honda State Park, our favorite Florida State Park, is still being restored, or at least our favorite spot – the beach along the Atlantic Ocean. Continue reading my favorite place – a photo challenge →

indoor flora

Family, Learning, Science, Teaching and Learning, Weather, , , ,

It is Sunday morning and it’s that time of the year when we leap forward. I went to bed at a reasonable time last night, but I woke up early, earlier than I normally do on a Sunday morning. I would have preferred to stay under the covers for another hour or so of sleep, but I didn’t.

the purple hyacinth slowly opens up and blooms

It was still dark and I looked out my bedroom window at the crescent moon rising in the eastern sky. Friday morning, I was up at the same time, though being up was a conscious choice, the sky was clear and I could see Mars, Saturn, and Jupiter ibn line with the moon. It was impressive.

It’s been over a month since I’ve posted. The late winter and early spring is always a grind. School is busy and home life is busy, too. It’s also the time in my school life when I see the hard work that my students and I have put it begin to blossom.

Several weeks ago, I was greeted with the quote below during my morning routine of the Five Minute Journal.

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” Anais Nin (1903-1977) Cuban-American author

It was Presidents Day (2/19) and I planned to write that day – it was a holiday and I was off from school. But, I didn’t finish the post or really start beyond typing the quote and saving the file on my laptop.

That was almost three weeks ago. It seems like the other day, a blink in time. Continue reading indoor flora →

Snow day – three things for Friday

adventure, Family, growing up, Learning, teaching, Weather, Writing, , , , , , ,

It’s a snow day today. I am in my basement office chair listening to a new favorite band – the Avett Brothers. It’s peaceful and calm and using the morning to catch up on stuff that needs catching up on. I have a stack of papers in my school backpack that I plan to get to, but for now, at this moment, I can be present and reflect on the week behind and the week ahead.

the morning view through the front window

The SNOW DAY
Yesterday the buzz in the hallways and classrooms was all about the impending snow day. There was a lot of energy flowing- the kids, the teachers, everybody. I told my students that what we started Thursday was due Monday, regardless. So far, I have four ‘My Life as a Water Molecule’ stories handed in. Pretty good considering they’ve got three more days to do it.

I was on my way home when I got the call, or rather the tweet. First my daughter’s school district and a second later my school district tweeted – no school Friday.

I’d stopped at the grocery store on the way home for food and supplies my wife had asked me to get. She’d been shopping earlier and our fridge is full. She was working on a pot of chili when it began to snow. There is no good reason to leave the house today, except to clean the driveway or play in the snow.

It’s supposed to snow all day today and snow more tomorrow and Sunday. Then, next week rain is forecast for Thursday. February in the Midwest. Spring will be here before we know it.

SPRING is on the way….
My students and I have been tracking weather and sunshine data for 37 locations across the globe ranging from Tromso, Norway to Stanley, Falkland Islands since December and 35 more locations in between. Last week, we crossed the ten hours of sunlight threshold and we are headed for equal daylight and night on the equinox March 21st. Today we have 10 Hours and 23 Minutes, even though it’s cloudy and snowing. After the snow storm, the sun will shine brightly and the sky will be clear blue. Continue reading Snow day – three things for Friday →

numbers

Family, growing up, Writing, , ,

“I don’t know my mom’s phone number,”

I was thinking the other day. It was a random thought that passed quickly through my brain.

I realize that the statement sounds awful, but it’s true. What I really mean is that I don’t remember her phone number. I do have it and I call her often, but I have to look it up in my address book. Simply, press the name – mom cell – in my favorites on my cell phone and the number rings.

It’s a sad consequence of the digital age.

My mom’s phone number was 713-494-2240, it was mine, too until I moved away in the mid-1980s. My mom had the phone number until a few years back when she dropped it in favor of an internet phone and a cell phone to save money, but she has since dropped the internet phone. Now, she only a cell phone number and it’s in my cell phone’s address book along with a picture I took in October 2016 when we were visiting. The picture shows up on the screen when she calls. It makes me smile.

My mom still lives in the house where my brothers and I grew up. This past August she celebrated 50 years in the same house and the same address. We moved into the house in the summer before I started kindergarten and I lived there until I moved away in college. My brothers moved away to start their lives on their own after I did, but they still live in the area.

We grew up in the era of rotary dial phones. The kind of phones you couldn’t speed dial and had to place your finger in number slot and turn it all the way and let it return, then repeat the process until all of the numbers had been dialed.

When we first moved in, all we had to do was dial four numbers for local phone numbers, just the last four.

As a kid, I knew all sorts of numbers and I still do. Robert and Jimmy were 3351, Jimmy and Jeff were 3355, and Jimmy and Chris are backdoor neighbors were 2267. With exception of Jimmy and Jeff, whose parents still live in the neighborhood, all of those kids and their families have long since moved away. Scattered like seeds in the wind.   Continue reading numbers →

weathered – a photo challenge

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Sunday morning. It was cold out -11 if you use the metric system, or 12 if you use the English system. Whichever scale you use, it’s still cold. It was much warmer Wednesday and Thursday with rain and all the snow melted, but on Friday, January’s cold returned.

I shouldn’t be surprised, it is January and I do live in the Midwest where January temperatures are often below freezing. Often, well below freezing.

my favorite deck chair, weathered and exposed

Freezing temperatures create problems for us here, they harden the ground and create potholes in the roads making travel sometimes hazardous. The freeze and thaw season comes later in winter when the sun’s rises higher in the sky and temperatures rise above freezing during the day and plunge back below freezing at night. That’s when the real weathering begins – freeze and thaw – and it wreaks havoc on roads and anything manmade, or even natural. Rocks break down into smaller rocks, then pebbles, and even smaller. It’s a vicious cycle, yet it’s an essential part of our world. Nothing is really permanent, everything is in transit – from somewhere to someplace.

It’s Monday morning and it’s -7, 18F or so, it’s actually warmed up, so to speak. It began snowing Sunday evening and the ground which was bare this morning, is coated with a fresh layer of white snow. The world is a much brighter place this morning.

trees out back, the snow continues to fall

The days pass quickly and like the weather, a new day is fresh, clean, and ready to be weathered away by time and the elements. Continue reading weathered – a photo challenge →

Happy New Year – 2018

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I’m a day late with this post. I had hoped (and planned) to write yesterday, but didn’t. I found time for other things beside blogging, more important things – family, a walk along the frozen lakeshore, preparing and eating dinner, and having fun playing dominoes and watching the bowl games with my family.

It’s good. It was a very good day. The first of many in 2018.

I am not much into New Year’s resolutions. I used to develop New Year’s resolution, but they were often abandoned as the year progressed. Now, my ‘new year’ tends to land at the end of the school year and beginning of summer. I make my resolutions in late May and early June as I reflect on the previous school year and get to audition for retirement. I always ‘fail’ my audition and get to go back to school every fall. Someday, I hope to pass the audition and I’ll retire from teaching, but I don’t intend to ‘retire’ from life.

this morning’s view, one way to see it
or another way to see it….

Last year I made an exception and took on writing and mailing, with postage, a thank you note each day. I began in January and did well writing the first few months, but my writing dropped off as the year progressed. Though I fell short in my writing, my thankfulness and gratitude grew. I plan to continue being thankful and writing (and mailing) thank you notes into the 2018 and beyond. Continue reading Happy New Year – 2018 →

from turkey to soup – a transformation

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It’s Thanksgiving break and I am thankful. I was thankful Thursday morning and I am especially thankful as the break winds to close. It’s Saturday morning, I’ve been on break since Wednesday, really Tuesday night. Three days have passed seemingly in the blink of an eye, or rather two eyes.

I’ve been taking advantage of the break to a couple of nights of good rest. Wednesday and Thursday morning, I was up before the sun rose. Friday morning, I slept late and the sun was up and Ivy was gone. This morning, I was awakening as the sun was rising and Ivy was still nestled up against my leg.

On Thanksgiving Day, the turkey is my job. It’s a pretty simple job, though I have leared that some people make a mess of it. I follow a simple plan.

  • I remove the turkey from the refrigerator and allow to rest in the sink for an hour
  • Preheat the oven to 400F.
  • Unwrap the turkey, rinse, and pat dry.
  • Place the turkey in the roasting pan
  • Pour 1 quart of cold water in the roasting pan
  • Season with salt, pepper, and fresh thyme.
  • Insert the oven probe in the thigh, making sure not to hit the bone
  • Place the turkey in the oven
  • Set the oven temperature down to 325F and the probe temperature to 175F.
step 1 – roasting the turkey

That’s what I do. I use a meat thermometer to check the temperature of the turkey when the oven probe reaches 175 – just as a backup. This year, I added another 5F to finish the turkey and removed the turkey from the oven and covered it with foil until we were ready to eat.

When we were ready with all the fixings – mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with coconut topping, Brussels sprouts, dressing, and gravy, I carved the turkey and re-heated to make sure it was hot. Then we sat down for Thanksgiving Dinner. It was delicious, but it tasted better because the family was together.

After Thanksgiving dinner, W cleaned up. An hour or so later, I finished the job and got down to the business of transforming the turkey into turkey vegetable soup.

I removed all of the meat from the turkey and broke the carcass into smaller bits that fit in the stock pot.  I cover the bones with cold water and placed the pot on the stove over medium-low heat. The stock then slowly simmers uncovered and it takes several hours to render the turkey stock. Before I went to bed Thursday night, I turned off the heat and covered the stock pot.

step 2, making the turkey stock

Continue reading from turkey to soup – a transformation →

temporary: birthdays and fall leaves

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It’s Sunday morning and I am slowly getting a start to the new week. I am on my second cup of coffee and Ivy has been outside on patrol and she’s back inside. She’s curled up at my feet beneath the desk where I do much of my thinking and writing.

Ivy loves resting in the leaf pile, I think she feels camouflaged….

Friday was my birthday. It was also the coldest day of school year so far. I checked the temperature and it was 16°F. I smiled and thought back to when I was 16 years old. I’ve grown up, but in many ways, I am still that kid who at the age of 16 was looking ahead at the future and wondering and dreaming. It’s been 40 years since that birthday. You can do the math, but I don’t feel like a 56 year-old, however a 56 year old should feel.

Age is a number and it’s temporary. I am constantly learning and growing, or I should be.

Yesterday, I slept late. It was nice to sleep past my normal weekday wake up time of 4:30 AM.

It’s Fall and the cold weather has zapped the trees and the fallen leaves have covered the lawn like a thick blanket with leaves sticking in the beds along the foundation and fences, wherever there might be a stopping point from the wind.

the yard before work began in earnest

The leaves are temporary. They sprout in the Spring and last until the Fall. The cycle is lasts a little less than 200 days from mid-April to early November, sometimes longer, sometimes shorter depending on the year. We have a couple of trees that are now leafless and several trees which are relentlessly holding on to their leaves. By the end of the month, the trees will release their grip and the leaves will fall to the ground. Continue reading temporary: birthdays and fall leaves →